Football transfer rumours: Cesc Fábregas to return to Arsenal?

Tuesday 7 May 2013 04.16 EDT
First published on Tuesday 7 May 2013 04.16 EDT

On Sunday it's a treatabix

On a Monday it's throw back the sheetabix

When they're hungry, it's eatabix

When he needs energy, it's fast on his beatabix

With all the goodness of gossip it's completabix

No wonder it's unbeatabix!

Theologians know that the scriptures proclaim that for the Second Coming meekness and the donkey will be replaced by triumph and a white horse. When José Mourinho returns to Chelsea this summer – it is written in the Ikea receipt – He will be accompanied, according to the Daily Mirror, by Steve Kean, the former Blackburn Rovers manager and Fulham assistant, who will play the role of the native in his coaching staff. He will be greeted by all the customary hosannas as well as a welcome present of Bayer Leverkusen's André Schürrle, traded for Kevin De Bruyne and adequate coinage.

That won't be enough for Him, though. He wants to bring Benfica's Nemanja Matic back to the Bridge, the makeweight in the David Luiz transfer returning to west London figuratively to take off his Nana Mouskouri bins, pull out his Plain Jane Superbrain hair restrainer and unleash his silky mane while the Shed End declares: "Why, you're beautiful."

Better still, if ever José or Stevé fancy handing over team talk duties they've got the perfect dressing-room dynamo in Demba Ba. The Sun reports that last Saturday he addressed his former Newcastle team-mates on the eve of their draw with West Ham at Upton Park. "I went to see them at the hotel and I tried to give them a bit of motivation because I wouldn't like to see them go down," he said. Heart the size of a cabbage, that lad.

More prodigal returns are prophesied in the Daily Star where it asserts that should Cesc Fábregas be off-loaded by Barcelona this summer after a "poor season" he only has eyes for the Premier League and one club in particular. Hull … er Arsenal. The Star says that with £5m still due on the "extras" from his sale, the Gunners may swoop, or perhaps pounce, to ensure love spreads for his second coming.

Why so metropolitan? Hey, the Mill is a service industry not a manufacturing one. In Germany they make their own. Broken Britain, eh? Wait, the Mirror has been Up North and has discovered that Manchester United's pursuit of Juventus's Claudio Marchisio will be brought to fruition if they chuck Nani into the bargain.

Elsewhere at Carrington the Mail observes that Manchester City are plotting to equip themselves with Atlético Madrid's Olivier Torres for £8m (while making a dig at Fernando "Eustache Dauger" Torres's expense – "no, not that Torres") and Vélez Sársfield's right-back Gino Peruzzi who popped Neymar into his back pocket in last year's Copa Libertadores.

Sam Allardyce is ready to go keeper shopping and fancies the look of Villa's £5m Brad Guzan but will probably be told that he can look as much as he likes "but watch your hands West Ham". And Celtic's Victor Wanyama has more suitors than Elsie Tanner, Southampton now joining the queue behind Manchester United, Arsenal and Liverpool.

And finally, the Mail reports that Robbie Fowler has been interviewed for the vacant manager's job at Macclesfield Town but faces a fight with five other short-listed candidates. Famous Maxonians include Nick Robinson, Ian Curtis, Steve Morris and David Dickinson and it appears you can get on the list simply by living in the area. Seeing The Growler reputedly owns most of Cheshire, Lancashire and Westmoreland, that shouldn't be too difficult.